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1976 Spanish Grand Prix
2 May |officialname = XXII Gran Premio de España |circuit = Circuito del Jarama |location = Madrid, Spain |circuittype = Permanent racing facility |lapdistance = 3.404 |laps = 75 |distance = 255.300 |pole = James Hunt |polenation = GBR |poleteam = |poletime = 1:18.52 |fastestlap = 1:20.93 |fastestlapdriver = Jochen Mass |fastestlapnation = FRG |fastestlapteam = |fastestlapnumber = 52 |winner = James Hunt |winnernation = GBR |winnerteam = |second = Niki Lauda |secondnation = AUT |secondteam = |third = Gunnar Nilsson |thirdnation = SWE |thirdteam = }} The 1976 Spanish Grand Prix, otherwise known as the XXII Gran Premio de España, was the fourth round of the 1976 FIA Formula One World Championship, staged at the Circuito del Jarama on the 2 May 1976.'GRAND PRIX RESULTS: SPANISH GP, 1976', grandprix.com, (Inside F1 Inc., 2014), http://www.grandprix.com/gpe/rr268.html, (Accessed 22/01/2018) The race would be remembered as one of the most controversial in F1 history, as race winner James Hunt was initially disqualified after post-race scrutineering. It had gone well for Hunt from the start of the weekend, the racer claiming pole in the final qualifying session. Increasingly arch rival Niki Lauda would start alongside the Brit yet again, while the rookie Gunnar Nilsson claimed third ahead of Carlos Reutemann in the engined . Indeed, the only black mark for Hunt during the weekend would be the fact that Lauda once again beat him into the first corner, as the Austrian had done twice in the opening three races. Vittorio Brambilla sprinted up the order to third, while Patrick Depailler, debuting the new six-wheeled Tyrrell P34, shot into fourth. The opening stages of the race would see Brambilla slowly tumble down the order, before retiring on lap 21 via an accident. Jacques Laffite was another early casualty, while Depailler managed to get to lap 25 before the P34 burned through its brakes. All of that promoted Jochen Mass into third, and Nilsson back into the top four. Out front, meanwhile, Hunt was closing onto the back of Lauda, and duly snatched the lead on lap 32, soon followed by teammate Mass. Those two would then run away, set for a dominant McLaren one-two, only for Mass' engine to fail just ten laps from the flag. Hunt eased his pace to a cruise over the following laps, claiming victory from Lauda by over half a minute. Nilsson survived to finish third, the last man on the lead lap, while Carlos Reutemann finally had a trouble free-run in the engined to claim fourth. Chris Amon in the , and Carlos Pace in the other Brabham-Alfa completed the points. After the race, however, the FIA announced the disqualification of Hunt's car, stating that the rear of the car was wider than the regulations allowed when measured after the race. McLaren protested, stating that the discrepancy was down to the Goodyear tyres, which expanded due to the heat caused during the race. Hunt would ultimately be reinstated after an FIA tribunal in July 1976, although McLaren were fined $3,000 after their initial comments. Background As the first European round of the season, and with almost all of the F1 circus based in Europe, there was little surprise that the majority of the entrants for the 1976 Spanish Grand Prix had been at the Circuito del Jarama for over a week before the meeting got underway.D.S.J., 'The Spanish Grand Prix', motorsportmagazine.com, (Motor Sport, 01/06/1976), https://www.motorsportmagazine.com/archive/article/june-1976/35/spanish-grand-prix, (Accessed 22/01/2018) The result would be a vastly superior entry list than had been seen for some time, including some new faces and some new equipment. The circuit itself, meanwhile, had gone unchanged since F1's last visit in 1974, having become a prime testing venue for Grand Prix cars over the winter months. Among the most intriguing entries in Spain would be the effort, which arrived the earliest of all the teams with four cars. Two of these would be the team's old 007s which had been campaigned over the past couple of seasons, while the other pair were the Tyrrell team's new P34s. Remarkable for having six wheels, four ten inch diameter wheels at the front and eighteens on the back, the new P34 proved more than capable in the hands of Patrick Depailler over the week. He duly opted to try out the newer P34 for the upcoming race, while Jody Scheckter decided to stick with his conventional 007. Elsewhere, spent the week refining their 77s after a difficult start to the season, having officially picked up Mario Andretti from . The Italian-American racer duly got to grips with his new car, while Swedish rookie Gunnar Nilsson seemed to be getting more and more confident as the week went on. Andretti's former team Parnelli, meanwhile, had come to rue their decision to enter F1 in the first place, the loss of title sponsors Firestone back in effectively meaning the company had bankrupted itself by the spring of . Championship leaders , meanwhile, had been busy since the Long Beach Grand Prix completing two new 312Ts, which were both put through a shakedown at Jarama. Defending Champion Niki Lauda would take the newer of the pair, with his car serving as a spare, while Clay Regazzoni took the other chassis. However, there were to be some question marks over whether the Ferrari domination could continue, as Lauda was sporting some bad bruising on his chest after an accident on his farm near Salzburg. Ferrari's emerging rivals had one new car on offer ahead of the Spanish Grand Prix, handed to Jochen Mass as team leader James Hunt preferred his "old" car. Likewise, had one new chassis and two older ones for their drivers Tom Pryce and Jean-Pierre Jarier, both of whom were hoping to have better luck during the race. They were joined by the rejuvenated team, which once again fielded highly rated youth Alan Jones alongside Brett Lunger in their new TS19s. Over at it was business as usual, with their quartet of mismatched creations getting through the "practice week" without issue. The "factory" pairing of Vittorio Brambilla and Ronnie Peterson headlined the effort in the #9 and #10 cars, while Hans-Joachim Stuck and Arturo Merzario were partnered in the #34 and #35 entries. The chassis had also been shuffled around in the quartet, with Merzario now using the newer 761, while Peterson took over Stuck's old car. There were to be two separate " " entries in Spain, as Frank Williams partially left his own team as Canadian businessman Walter Wolf assumed full control of the board after the race in Long Beach. The old Frank Williams Racing Cars entry officially became Walter Wolf Racing in the buildup to the Spanish race, with Jacky Ickx and Michel Leclère retained as drivers. Mr. Williams himself brought along one of the team's old FW04s, putting Emilio Zapico in the seat, although he was still technically team manager of all three cars. There were to be five cars in Spain over the Grand Prix weekend, three entered by Bernie Ecclestone's team and two by new entrants RAM Racing. The three factory cars were the new BT45s, in which Carlos Reutemann and Carlos Pace would continue their struggles against the team's so far unreliable F12 engines. The RAM Racing cars were the factory team's old BT44Bs, which were entered for Spaniard Emilio de Villota and Swiss racer Loris Kessel. Elsewhere, arrived with two cars, one for former World Champion Emerson Fittipaldi and the other for Ingo Hoffmann, although both had trouble during the practice week. The , in contrast, came through the test week in sterling form, with Jacques Laffite hopeful of claiming another points finish for the all French squad. The remains of were among the few to not take part, Harald Ertl arriving just before the race meeting, while brought two cars along for sole driver John Watson as usual. Completing the field would be a pair of s, although they would race under completely different teams, badging and entries. The factory squad, supporting Chris Amon, had finally got the newest Morris Nunn project, the N176 to run reliably, while the old N174 was sold to Dutch businessman HB Bewaking, who had backed the team previously. However, the deterioration of the relationship between sponsor and team had seen Bewaking start up his own effort, hiring Australian racer Larry Perkins to race his self-entered car, run by the Hoogenboom brothers. The two brothers renamed the car a 001 after making some minor revisions, with the squad arriving shortly before the final day of testing. Into the Championship, and despite being beaten to victory for the first time in 1976, Lauda had continued to hold his dominant lead, actually growing his advantage over second to fourteen points in the United States. Depailler had remained in second, while race winner Regazzoni leapt up the order having failed to score in the opening two rounds. Mass and Hunt now completed the top five, while Andretti rounded out the twelve drivers on the scorers list. Ferrari left Long Beach with an equally impressive lead atop the International Cup for Manufacturers' standings, the Italian firm fourteen points clear of Tyrrell-Ford Cosworth after only three rounds. The Surrey squad, in spite of their constant use of the FIA's technical rulebook to throw at their competitors, retained second ahead of McLaren-Ford Cosworth, while Shadow-Ford Cosworth lost ground in fourth. Elsewhere Ligier-Matra had claimed their first points in F1, as had Fittipaldi-Ford Cosworth. Entry list The full entry list for the is outlined below: Practice Overview Qualifying Practice/qualifying were to be staged across four sessions, three of which would be timed to decide the grid, while one was set aside for long running. Both Friday and Saturday at Jarama would be given over to practice for the Grand Prix, with four one and a half hour long sessions held in warm sunshine. The target time for the top teams would be the pole time from 1974, a 1:18.44 set by Niki Lauda. Report Most of the dramas on Friday's first session were to be found at the team, who had only just arrived at the circuit after their transporter broke down en-route to Spain. As prop-shaft troubles hampered their arrival, Ingo Hoffmann would only get three laps in before his engine blew itself apart, leaving him on the sidelines until the team could source another one. Elsewhere, Ronnie Peterson suffered successive electrical and bodywork failures in the blue-yellow , while the sister car of Hans-Joachim Stuck spent the morning dragging its orange bodywork around. Setting the pace, meanwhile, would be James Hunt in the #11 , with the Brit having a trouble free morning en-route to a 1:18.52. That was enough to beat Championship leader Lauda by over three tenths of a second, although the Austrian was battling against his badly bruised ribs. Indeed, such was Lauda's lack of personal manoeuvrability, that the mechanics had to lift the top half of the monocoque off the car to allow the Austrian to climb out of the cockpit. Other highlights in the first session would be the performance of the new Tyrrell P34 which, in the hands of Patrick Depailler was up in fifth place and demonstrating phenomenal front-end grip. Also looking surprisingly strong was Gunnar Nilsson in the new-for-1976 Lotus 77, with the young Swede a full second faster than American ace teammate Mario Andretti. Jacques Laffite, meanwhile, was completing some metronomic laps in the , recording a 1:19.39 in the middle of a 54 lap run, while Carlos Pace finally had some decent timed running in the . The second session on Friday was reduced to a single hour, although that fact did not deter Tom Pryce from completing 32 tours around Jarama, albeit without any real evidence of quick pace. Another man counting up laps was Hoffmann, although his were limited to his pit garage as he paced around on foot as his new Cosworth engine refused to fire. Another man left to walk around Jarama, albeit only for a few yards, was Pace, whose clean running came to an end in some Alfa branded smoke, moments before Carlos Reutemann wrote off his car in the catch fencing after a mistake. They would share the spare Brabham until Pace's engine was changed. Away from the mechanical dramas and Hunt was still leading the charge, unable to beat his time from the morning but still fast enough to hold provisional pole. Lauda was still battling his ribs, while Hunt's teammate Jochen Mass moved into the top five after a change of gearbox during the lunch break. Chris Amon was another running stronger after the break, up among the midfield runners in the new , while , and found themselves in the scrap to qualify for the race. Saturday's running would be restricted to a single session in the afternoon as per the FIA's new rules, although the "untimed" morning session would drag on far longer than anyone expected. The source of these delays would almost exclusively be the Fittipaldi team, as Hoffmann's new engine expired after a single lap, while ex-Champion Emerson Fittipaldi wiped out a large amount of catch fencing after a rare mistake. The only other time eating incident of the morning involved Vittorio Brambilla, who beached himself in the gravel at turn one after experimenting with his braking point. Into the final session of qualifying and with no improvements coming from the fight for pole, leaving Hunt and Lauda on the front row, the afternoon was all about the fight to qualify. Star of that particular battle would be Larry Perkins in his " ", with the Aussie setting his best time of the weekend to sneak into twenty-fourth, the final qualifying spot. Out therefore went Brett Lunger, Loris Kessel, Emilio Zapico, Emilio de Villota, Harald Ertl and, unsurprisingly, Hoffmann, who recorded just three laps in two days. As the battle to simply qualify stole the show there were to be some intriguing changes in the middle of the pack. The best of these would be Depailler, who leapt into third in the six-wheeled P34, lapping a full second faster than teammate Jody Scheckter in the more conventional Tyrrell 007. Amon, meanwhile, caused a stir by breaching the top ten in the new Ensign, while Laffite record a terrific total of 142 laps in the Ligier-Matra across the two days, despite the fact that the race was only to run for 75. After qualifying several teams were forced to make changes to bodywork, with McLaren, Lotus and March all having to modify their rear and cockpit bodywork to comply with new FIA rules. Fortunately these changes did not affect the qualifying order. Qualifying Results The full qualifying results for the are outlined below: *T Indicates a driver used their test/spare car to set their best time in that session. *'Bold' indicates a driver's best/qualifying time. Grid Race Raceday proved to be the warmest of the weekend, with bright sunshine causing temperatures to climb into the 25°C window just before the start. The schedule was also revised to allow for a live-broadcast of the race to South America, meaning that the pre-race warm-up was held at 11:00am, with the race start at 4:00pm. Even so there would be delays to the actual start, the last of which saw Emerson Fittipaldi swap to Ingo Hoffmann's rebuilt car after a brake failure on his way to the grid. Report It was Niki Lauda who shot into the lead at the start, streaking past pole sitter James Hunt after sensing the slightest twitch from the starter's flag. Hunt was just fractions of a second slower but lost out, although he did do enough to keep a fast starting Vittorio Brambilla at bay. Patrick Depailler got away in fourth ahead of Jochen Mass, while Clay Regazzoni lost out in the middle of the pack after a poor launch from the line. The opening lap would bot see any major incidents, meaning it was still Lauda leading from Hunt, Brambilla and Depailler at the end of the first tour of Jarama. Mass and Jacques Laffite were next, tagging onto the leaders, while Regazzoni was trying to barge his way up the order in the middle of the pack. Well behind everyone else, meanwhile, would come Tom Pryce in the , who had picked up so much dust from the start that his throttle slides had jammed shut, meaning he had to wait until they had been cleaned by the car's fuel flow. Lauda began to inch clear at the front during the first few laps, with Hunt having to fend off Depailler and Mass, who forced their way past Brambilla at the start of the second tour. The top four would soon pull clear of Brambilla in fifth, leaving the Italian to fight with Laffite, Gunnar Nilsson and Mario Andretti, while Regazzoni scrapped with Jody Scheckter at the head of the next group. Elsewhere there would be an early retirement for Fittipaldi as the Brazilian suffered a gearstick failure in the second of his brother's cars. After ten laps the race had entered a distinct pattern, with Hunt pressuring Lauda for the lead while Depailler and Mass looked on a few yards behind. Laffite, meanwhile, was eyeing a move on Brambilla as the driver continued to struggle with a suspected car issue. Indeed it seemed as if all of the multi-coloured Marches were in trouble, with Ronnie Peterson in the pits with transmission troubles, while Arturo Merzario and Hans-Joachim Stuck were overtaken by Jacky Ickx in the lowly at the back of the field. With a stalemate out front attention focused on the struggling Brambilla, who was powerless to prevent Laffite from charging clear once the Frenchman elbowed his way past on lap twelve. Nilsson was the next man in the queue and tried every trick in the book to take the orange March, eventually forcing his way up the inside of Brambilla into turn one at the start of lap nineteen. The pair hit the brakes at the same time, but whereas Nilsson actually slowed and made it around the corner, Brambilla went skating off into the gravel trap, requiring assistance from the marshals to get back underway. Brambilla would rejoin having lost a lap and a lot of positions, before ultimately retiring with terminally damaged suspension. Laffite was another casualty, the forced to stop its pursuit of the leaders when the Frenchman stopped for two laps to have a gear selection issue cured. Also in trouble was the six-wheeled of Depailler, who lost out to Mass after suddenly finding he had a "spongy" brake pedal on lap 25. A lap later and the Frenchman was climbing out of the P34 at the side of the circuit, a complete brake failure spitting the car into the catch fencing backwards at the end of the start/finish straight. With Depailler out of contention Mass could aid teammate Hunt's pursuit of Lauda, with the Austrian doggedly defending from the Brit in the midst of back markers. This ultimately gave Hunt the advantage, with the charging past Lauda into turn one as the pair lapped one of the back markers. Lauda managed to fend off Mass for two more laps before the German racer got the upper-hand, leaving Lauda to nurse his car, and bruised ribs, in third. As the race reached half-distance the order was now Hunt leading from Mass, with Lauda dropping back, while Nilsson was up to fourth after the Laffite and Depailler problems. Andretti was up to fifth in the second of the Loti only to suffer a gearbox failure, promoting Regazzoni into the top five. Scheckter was a disappointing sixth ahead of a scrap between Jean-Pierre Jarier and Carlos Reutemann, while John Watson and Chris Amon were into the top ten. Indeed the Jarier, Reutemann fight was part of an entertaining series of battles encompassing seventh through to eleventh which had been fought since the opening stages. Although the brawl had seen most of its early contenders fall to mechanical woes, the fight was only truly broken up when Watson sent himself spinning in the , splitting the quintet into to pairs. This allowed Jarier to pull clear of Reutemann and catch Scheckter, while Amon was left to fight with Carlos Pace in the second . Watson would ultimately rejoin at the back of the field, only to suffer a huge engine blow-up in his Penske that dumped oil over the circuit. Scheckter was another to see his engine fail, albeit in less spectacular fashion after a belt snapped, while Regazzoni was forced to stop in the pits for three laps after discovering a major fuel leak in his cockpit. Pryce was struggling at the back of the field, fighting the two Wolf-Williams entries, Alan Jones and Larry Perkins, with Laffite up the road nursing the . Into the closing stages and another flurry of retirements saw Jarier, then up to fifth, disappear with an electrical failure, before McLaren's perfect day was ruined by an engine failure. The casualty was Mass, whose engine had detonated on the entry of the final corner on lap 65, leaving him to coast straight into the pits. The McLaren crew immediately signalled to Hunt that he should ease his pace, meaning the Brit was left to cruise to the flag. With that, bar some minor dramas at the back of the order, the race was run, with Hunt duly cruising home thirty seconds clear of Lauda, despite having the sister car of Regazzoni sat in his mirrors for the final five laps. Nilsson, meanwhile, was a jubilant third for Lotus after an excellent display, with Reutemann securing the first points finish for the Brabham-Alfa, which had atleast run reliably if not quickly. Amon was also a happy driver having finished fifth in the new , while Pace rounded out the points in the second of the Brabhams. Ickx, Pryce, Jones (who completed the last five laps stuck in third gear), Michel Leclère, Regazzoni, Laffite and Perkins the other finishers. Post-race After the race all thirteen finishers had their cars put through a series of scrutineering checks, which had been tightened in recent races after a series of complaints, largely led by the team. The scrutineers ultimately found that Hunt's McLaren, and Laffite's Ligier, were illegal, the former's too wide, while the latter's aerofoil was found to be outside of the permitted area. Both were subsequently disqualified from the result by the organisers, although both McLaren and Ligier-Matra launched appeals. These appeals would ultimately be heard in July 1976, with the FIA deciding to reinstate both drivers after seeing the evidence provided by both teams. Results The full results for the are outlined below: ** Hunt's disqualification was overturned by the FIA on the 5 July. *† Laffite was also excluded from the results after the race, only to have his twelfth place reinstated on the 5 July. Milestones *Fiftieth World Championship Grand Prix to feature a engine. *First entry by as a "constructor". **The Boro chassis was really an N175, rebadged by owner HB Bewaking. *First entries by RAM Racing. *Larry Perkins made his World Championship debut. *Maiden entries for Loris Kessel, Emilio de Villota and Emilio Zapico. *First race for the famed Tyrrell P34. **The P34 became the first six-wheeled car to enter and qualify for a World Championship Grand Prix. *Third pole position set by James Hunt. *Hunt claimed his second career victory. * earned their sixteenth win as a constructor. **Engine supplier claimed their 87th win. *Gunnar Nilsson earned his first podium finish. **It was also the Swede's maiden points finish. *Second and final fastest lap recorded by Jochen Mass. *Tenth fastest lap set by a McLaren chassis. **Ford Cosworth powered a car to an 80th fastest lap. *Chris Amon claimed his final points finish. **In doing so Amon became the last New Zealand born racing driver to finish in the points until the 2018 Azerbaijan Grand Prix. Standings Once the mess surrounding James Hunt's disqualification had been sorted and the Brit restored as victor, the Championship stood thus after the Spanish Grand Prix. Defending Champion Niki Lauda continued to lead by fifteen points, double Hunt's corrected tally, while Patrick Depailler slipped to third. Clay Regazzoni and Jochen Mass completed the top five, while Gunnar Nilsson shot up the table, gaining a huge total of sixteen places. With Hunt reinstated the gap at the top of the International Cup for Manufacturers' had been reduced, although still held a daunting lead with their 33 point tally. moved up into second with Hunt's restored heroics, some fifteen points behind, overtaking on thirteen. were big movers, up into fifth and level with , while had secured the first points of their new partnership. ** Corrected to show points after Hunt was reinstated as the race winner. References Images and Videos: * References: Category:Grand Prix articles Category:Spanish Grand Prix Category:1976 Grands Prix